General sees ground forces as U.S. option

Dempsey: Would suggest it if airstrikes on militants fail

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel (left) and Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, brief senators Tuesday on White House plans for taking on the Islamic State.
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel (left) and Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, brief senators Tuesday on White House plans for taking on the Islamic State.

WASHINGTON -- Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress on Tuesday that he would recommend deploying U.S. combat forces against Islamic extremists in specific operations if the current strategy of airstrikes was not successful, offering a more expansive view of the U.S. role in the fight than President Barack Obama.

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In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, he said that although he was confident in the ability of the coalition of U.S., European and Middle Eastern governments to stop the Islamic State, he could not completely close the door to eventually asking Obama to commit ground troops to fight the group.

"My view at this point is that this coalition is the appropriate way forward. I believe that will prove true," he said. "But if it fails to be true, and if there are threats to the United States, then I, of course, would go back to the president and make a recommendation that may include the use of U.S. military ground forces."

Any future commitment of U.S. personnel on the ground could put Obama in a difficult position, as he has repeatedly insisted that no U.S. ground troops would engage in the battlefield.

In his speech last week announcing the expanded campaign against Islamic State, Obama said the military advisers he was sending to Iraq would help Iraqi and Kurdish forces with training, intelligence and equipment. But he emphatically ruled out front-line fighting.

"These American forces will not have a combat mission -- we will not get dragged into another ground war in Iraq," he said.

But Dempsey said the reality of the battle might make such a hands-off approach insufficient. When Iraqi or Kurdish forces are trying to dislodge militants from urban areas like Mosul, airstrikes are less effective because they can cause civilian casualties.

In those cases, the general said, he might recommend to the president that the United States send Special Operations troops to provide what he called "close combat advising," essentially working alongside Iraqi commanders in the field and helping them direct troops to targets.

Later Tuesday, asked about Dempsey's remark about ground troops, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said Obama "will not deploy ground troops in a combat role into Iraq or Syria."

Dempsey and the secretary of defense, Chuck Hagel, were on Capitol Hill on Tuesday to provide up-to-date information on the administration's plan for confronting the militant group. They said the plan would include the training and equipping of 5,000 Syrian fighters; the involvement of more than 40 coalition nations, including 30 that have pledged military support; and 1,600 U.S. military personnel who will assist.

But members of the committee sounded far from convinced that the plan would succeed. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said he doubted that 5,000 Syrian fighters -- who could not be trained for months -- would be able to fight off more than 30,000 Islamic State combatants.

"To many of us that seems like an inadequate response," McCain said.

Sen. Angus King of Maine, an independent who votes with Democrats, said he was concerned about what appeared to be a "whack-a-mole" approach.

Hagel and Dempsey took pains to portray the military campaign as a broad coalition-led fight.

"This is ultimately their fight," Hagel said, referring to the Middle Eastern countries that are most immediately threatened by the militant group.

They also stressed that this campaign would be nothing like the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

"This won't look like a 'shock and awe' campaign because that's not how ISIL is organized," said Dempsey, using an acronym for the Islamic State.

While the two men attempted to play down the scope of the U.S. military's involvement, Dempsey did acknowledge the open-ended and unpredictable nature of the fight ahead.

"Truly there is no military solution to ISIL," he said, adding that it could be defeated only with a more comprehensive approach that includes diplomacy. "That may be a tough pill to swallow. But there is no military solution."

Pressed by lawmakers on the ability of the U.S. to fully vet the Syrian rebel groups who would receive U.S. aid, Hagel said the U.S. will monitor the situation closely to ensure that weapons don't fall into the wrong hands.

"We have come a long way" in our ability to vet the moderate opposition, and the U.S. has learned a lot as it has funneled nonlethal aid to the rebels, Dempsey said.

The House is expected to vote today on a plan to give Obama the authority to train and equip Syrian rebels to battle the Islamic State.

House Republican leaders plan to offer the legislation as an amendment to a broader bill to keep the government funded into December and the Export-Import Bank open through June. The Senate would try to pass the bill by the end of the week.

The amendment, as drafted by the House Armed Services Committee, will require the Obama administration, 15 days before the program begins, to report to Congress how the training and equipping of Syrian rebels fits with a broader strategy to defeat the Islamic State, how the military plans to vet participants and how officers plan to stop the kinds of attacks by pupils on U.S. forces that have plagued training efforts in Afghanistan.

The bill also mandates that every 90 days, the administration will update Congress on the program's performance, how many trainees might have gone over to the militants and how trainees are using U.S. military equipment.

An Armed Services Committee official said the reporting language was similar to oversight requirements imposed on military training efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Finally, the legislation makes it clear that Congress is authorizing only the training of Syrian rebels and is not giving a green light to a broader use of military force against the Islamic State. It includes no additional money for the training effort but does allow the administration to accept contributions from foreign powers, in cash or in kind.

In the Senate, Republican leader Mitch McConnell announced he would support the measure, and Democratic leader Harry Reid predicted bipartisan approval.

Information for this article was contributed by Jeremy W. Peters, Mark Landler and Jonathan Weisman of The New York Times and by David Espo, Donna Cassata, Julie Pace, Lolita C. Baldor, Erica Werner, Alan Fram, Andrew Taylor and Bradley Klapper of The Associated Press.

A Section on 09/17/2014

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